Category Archives: Nonprofit Activities

With every year of delayed action, we move closer to runaway climate catastrophe. Pollution from our current energy system is already taking a massive toll on our public health and safety, with disproportionate impacts on low income and communities of color. And nearly a dozen new fossil fuel expansion projects are currently proposed in New Jersey, including several dirty, dangerous oil and gas pipelines through our irreplaceable water sources.

Join us for an important event on climate change and dirty energy development in New Jersey, and learn how we can transition the state to 100% renewables!

We’re in the processing of “re-branding” ourselves as Possible Planet(www.possibleplanet.org, of course). So what does this re-branding mean, and why are we doing it?

By “we” we mean here the Center for Regenerative Community Solutions, our 501(c)(3) umbrella entity under which we house a number of our own and others’ projects. These include not only global and local projects, but pretty much also every level in between. So not only are we concerned with what’s needed for “A Possible Planet” (the title of our forthcoming book), but we’re also working on Possible New Jersey (www.possiblenj.org) and Possible Bound Brook (www.possibleboundbrook.org) as examples of the application of what is really the paradigm-shifting model behind Possible Planet.

CRCS will be moving in several new directions this year, which we think will be of interest to a wider audience than just those of us interested in financing clean energy. We’ve been focusing more on communities in the past year, and on the values and vision that led to our mission, to assist local communities and neighborhoods to become more resilient in the face of the widening impacts of a changing climate.

We are proposing to work with one or two towns in New Jersey on their revitalization and self-renewal. Culture actually holds the key to greater local resilience, alongside the physical transformation of communities into eco-communities. And organization is what’s needed to transform culture. We are planning to create “civic cooperatives” that will lead these communities into a positive self-generating future. Many communities are today experiencing decline, or struggling to ignite a self-renewal, within the broader context of the need for a world for a world that shifts carbon from the atmosphere back into the soil. The cooperative model has proven itself to be more enduring, more beneficial, and often more valuable to communities than the conventional marketplace business model.

We make a difference in the world, by how we choose to invest our philanthropic dollars and/or investment funds.

We know that you know that we face planetary catastrophe if we don’t change the way our economy works today — we need to divest from those activities that are causing harm to the earth, and invest in ones that are restorative and regenerative. Whether you’re talking about large amounts, such as endowment funds of Ivy League universities, or the charitable donations you make at the end of the year, you know that moving from unsustainable practices to restorative and regenerative ones is what’s needed to reduce carbon in the atmosphere and put it back into the soil where it literally sustains life.

Our nonprofit, the Center for Regenerative Community Solutions (CRCS), is at the forefront of the effort to transform our economy into one that creates sustainable prosperity for everyone. Buckminster Fuller was amongst the first to recognize that we are technologically capable of producing a world that sustains everyone, and that gives us the opportunity to heal our planet, our psyche, and our civilization.

How would you like the members of your community to work together as part of a thriving and resilient ecosystem, providing for the basic needs of all citizens?

With your financial support, we intend to pilot a scalable, self-financing business model for communities to fulfill on their potential, with the capacity to regenerate themselves, indefinitely.

Starting with the formation of a “Civic Cooperative,” our approach includes award-winning regenerative processes from the Story of Place Institute and REconomy as well as other successful local, national and global methodologies.

In the wake of Governor Christie’s conditional veto of A2579/S1510, New Jersey PACE is initiating a coalition of key players to:

(a) resolve any issues standing in the way of a new, comprehensive, and workable bill — acceptable to all constituencies, insofar as possible — that initiates the development of a robust and secure PACE industry, and

(b) develop an industry alliance that helps expand the program to all sectors and all corners of the state.

Our main focus at this point is building out New Jersey PACE, an open-market platform for commercial PACE deals anywhere in the state. The critical amending legislation (A2579/S1510) passed at the end of June; we are now waiting for the front office review and the Governor’s signature. In the meantime we reviewing and revising parts of our web presence to make them more accessible and self-evident. We anticipate a significant backlog of projects once the law is signed, and we want to make the process as easy as possible for everyone to understand and implement.

At the same time, CRCS as an engine of change is continuing to evolve new projects – some our own, built on or around the PACE model; and some from others, such as Dr. Delton Chen’s Global4C project, which is attracting worldwide attention. We’re gradually getting into various models of “fiscal sponsorship” for organizations and projects that we see as compatible with or related to our mission. In most cases — such as our Regenerative Cohousing initiative — our goal is to bring these projects in-house, under our own umbrella; but in a couple of instances we may support fledgling organizations until they get their own IRS exemption.

Finally, we’re exploring further opportunities for individuals to profit from the transition to renewable energy — from the bulk purchase of green energy, the installation of solar with no upfront cost to the property owner, to the use of PACE in underserved communities and distressed neighborhoods. Stay tuned.

After 3 years of working to bring PACE to New Jersey, and close to a real launch, we have scheduledThe New Jersey PACE Summit – the first of its kind event for PACE in NJ. We are seeking Founding Sponsorships and Event Sponsorships, a schedule of which you can view at NJPACE-Sponsorship.

From the Sponsors’ perspectives, they’re passionate about being able to award dollars for something they believe in and want to support, while gaining recognition and acknowledgement far beyond what they could get through paid advertising.

Our goal in recognizing our Sponsors is therefore to convey something significant about them, and about their support for us.

Our first Founding Sponsor is an out-of-state company — MSL Group — that’s been doing PACE projects in other states. It’s ironic, perhaps, that no local company or firm would jump into the water as a Founding Sponsor. But it’s an indication of what energy services firms who are operating in states where PACE is thriving, know, that NJ firms don’t yet know: that PACE is actually as good as it sounds, for every stakeholder.

Hosted by CRCS, Dr. Delton Chen has unveiled a new web site — www.Global4C.org — explaining his proposal to use a new global complementary currency to reward carbon mitigation and sequestration. The proposal was recognized in last year’s MIT Climate Colab contest, and is explained in detail on the web site. Some notes on the project:

The idea for the Global 4C Mitigation proposal was initiated by Dr. Delton Chen in June 2013 at Al Gore’s Climate Reality workshop in Istanbul, Turkey, and wasconceived on the intuition that a new currency should be developed to globally finance greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation. Dr. Chen devised the theoretical framework while traveling in Eastern Europe and Central America in 2013.

As noted in NJSpotlight (Feb. 20, 2015), New Jersey was ranked 34th out of 50 states in the most recent State of American Wellbeing index of the 2014 Gallup-Healthways Index report. The study takes into account how people feel about their life’s purpose, social and financial life, physical health, and community.

The two areas in which New Jersey severely underperformed the rest of the country were purpose and community. Purpose was defined as liking what you do each day and being motivated to achieve goals. In this area New Jersey only ranked 43rd. And New Jersey’s leaders should take serious note of the ranking of 48 for community. This element was defined as liking where you live, feeling safe, and taking pride in your community.

This clearly underlines the need for the kinds of “regenerative community solutions” that we’re seeking to foster through our nonprofit. And it also shows how poorly NJ’s economic and political class are doing in serving the needs of the state overall.

Featured: Ecovillage NJ and Regenerative Cohousing Solutions

For a while now we’ve been giving serious consideration to where and how we might want to live during this next few years of our lives. Like many others in our age group, we’re officially “empty-nesters,” and are looking to live “more lightly” on the land. We’d also like to be part of a genuine community, where we have deeper relationships with our neighbors, and can work together to bring about more rapid social change.

About CRCS

The Center for Regenerative Community Solutions (CRCS) is a 501c3 NJ nonprofit organization committed to:
• Providing community engagement in planning for sustainability
• Assisting local governments to adapt to climate change
• Helping small businesses and other non-profits to reduce climate change impacts in low and moderate-income communities, including communities impacted by Hurricane Sandy